Newsletter

Van Brimmer: Shopping joins turkey, football as family Thanksgiving traditions

Sorry traditionalists, but it was quite obvious how many Savannahians spelled relief a few hours after gobbling gobbler on Thanksgiving.

S-H-O-P-P-I-N-G.

The term Black Friday is so 2010. Gray Thursday is now the national shopping holiday. And it won’t be long before Macy’s Thanksgiving morning business involves more than putting on a televised parade.

Bemoan the fact if you want. Stay at home out of protest. Digitally sign online petition after online petition.

Understand this reality, though — the turnout for doorbusters at 8 p.m. last Thursday was just as strong as those at 6 a.m. and 4 a.m. and midnight on Black Fridays past. Same goes for the Thanksgiving night lines outside Oglethorpe Mall

“The beauty of it is it allows you to shop, go home, go to bed, get up, shop some more, go home again for lunch or a nap, and shop again,” said Ellen Danos, a Black Friday shopping regular. “You don’t have to pick and choose as much.”

Given a choice, Black Friday shoppers will always pick more. More sales. More giveaways. More coupons.

Besides, Thanksgiving is a holiday of more. Who among us resists that extra helping of turkey? Or doesn’t beg for one more giant balloon in the Macy’s parade? Or wasn’t glad when the NFL added a third Thanksgiving Day game?

OK, Jets fan may want one less Thanksgiving football game, but only in hindsight.

Family bonding

The “protect turkey day for the sake of family” movement has no legs.

Or wings or breasts either.

“People should enjoy Thanksgiving with their families but then again people enjoy shopping and shopping with their families,” said Pam Miltiades, owner of the Stagg Shoppe menswear store in Oglethorpe Mall. “Black Friday shopping is a tradition in many families, so there’s really no reason it shouldn’t be a family activity on Thanksgiving.”

Thanksgiving shopping proved a family affair last week. Couples strolled hand in hand, still aglow from a successful doorbuster run. Mothers, daughters and grandmothers gleefully scrutinized their shopping lists, with a male member of the family close by carrying packages. Dads and sons teamed to dig through clearance bins of DVDs and video games.

Thanksgiving shopping could actually help the family dynamic. Men have long had football on Thanksgiving Day, often to the chagrin of women looking to get out of the house once the kitchen is clean and the tryptophan is slept off.

Now the ladies can enjoy their favorite sport.

Retail employees have a legitimate beef about the impact of Thursday openings on their family Thanksgivings. But then there are some jobs you take knowing they require sacrificing holidays.

Retail is one of those. Food service is another. Journalist, too.

Shoppers benefit

The consumer will win as Black Friday stretches back into Thanksgiving.

Retailers have already demonstrated creativity when it comes to early openings. Many stagger doorbuster events to highlight different types of products and a cross-section of shoppers.

Walmart, for example, went after toy buyers with an 8 p.m. “event,” electronics enthusiasts at 10 p.m. and hardware junkies on Friday morning. Several other retailers had their own variations of the same strategy.

Thanksgiving shopping also opens up the Black Friday experience to more consumers. Many shun shopping the day after Thanksgiving. They have long been unwilling to roll out of bed before dawn for the privilege of jockeying for a parking spot and wrestling a soccer mom for the must-have toy.

With the diehards battling on Thanksgiving, Black Friday could become a shopping day for the rest of us. It already has: Retail foot traffic rose 3.5 percent on Black Friday 2012 versus a year earlier, according to research firm ShopperTrak.

So don’t label retailers as the Grinches who stole Thanksgiving. They are just introducing a new holiday tradition.

Adam Van Brimmer’s column appears each Monday. He blogs several days a week at www.savannahnow.com and also is a social media regular @avanbrimmer on Twitter and Daddy Warbucks on Facebook.

Jobs

Search Savannah jobs

More

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP BUTLER, Okinawa, Japan — Marine Corps Captain James E. Frederick, who ejected from a Marine F/A-18 on Dec. 7, was pronounced dead after his body was found during search and rescue operations.